NATORAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 141 
difficulty and hazard that birds must run in their migrations, by 
reason of vast oceans, cross winds, &c.; because, if we reflect, a 
bird may travel from England to the Equator without launching out 
and exposing itself to boundless seas, and that by crossing the 
water at Dover, and again at Gibraltar. And I with the more con- 
fidence advance this obvious remark, because my brother has 
always found that some of his birds, and particularly the swallow 
kind, are very sparing of their pains in crossing the Mediterranean ; 
for when arrived at Gibraltar they do not 
‘* Rang’d in figure wedge their way, 
ee ee And set forth 
Their airy caravan high over seas 
Flying, and over lands with mutual wing 
Easing their flight:’"” . . .  .—MILTON. 
but scout and hurry along in little detached parties of six or seven 
in a company; and sweeping low, just over the surface of the land 
and water, direct their course to the opposite continent at the 
narrowest passage they can find. They usually slope across the 
bay to the south-west, and so pass over opposite to Tangier, which, 
it seems, is the narrowest space. 
In former letters we have considered whether it was probable 
that woodcocks in moonshiny nights cross the German ocean from 
Scandinavia. As a proof that birds of less speed may pass that 
sea, considerable as it is, I shall relate the following incident, 
which, though mentioned to have happened so many years ago, was 
strictly matter of fact:—As some people were shooting in the 
parish of Trotton, in the county of Sussex, they killed a duck in 
that dreadful winter, 1708-9, with a silver collar about its neck,* on 
which were engraven the arms of the king of Denmark. This 
anecdote the rector of Trotton at that time has often told to a near 
relation of mine; and, to the best of my remembrance, the collar 
was in the possession of the rector. 
At present I do not know anybody near the sea-side that will 
take the trouble to remark at what time of the moon woodcocks 
first come ; if I lived near the sea myself I would soon tell you more 
of the matter. One thing I used ts observe when I was a sports- 
man, that there were times in which woodcocks were so sluggish 
and sleepy that they would drop again when flushed just before the 
spaniels, nay, just at the muzzle of a gun that had been fired at 
’ “T have read a like anecdote of a swan.’’ 
